Price stamper and stainless steel pad holder

ABSTRACT

A holder for an inking pad is provided which is removably mountable on a manually operated printing stamper; the holder consists of a rectangular sheet of flexible material having notches cut out adjacent each of its corners and a rectangular slot positioned equidistantly from its upper and lower edges; the dimensions of the sheet are such that it may be bent into an arcuate shape and the notches positioned in engagement with the frame of the stamper whereby, due to its resilience, the holder will be maintained in engagement with the frame of the stamper; a felt inking pad is inserted through the slot of the holder so that a portion of the pad intersects the path of the printing elements of the stamper so that when the printing elements are actuated to move through the path, they will come into contact with the inking pad to receive a coating of ink.

[111 3,760,721 [4s] Sept. 25, 1973 [54] PRICE sT AMPER AND STAINLESSSTEE PAD HOLDER [76] Inventor: William F. Stier, Sr., 3015 Nabraska,

Sioux City, Iowa- [22 Filed: Mar. 17, 1971 211 App]. No.: 125,311

52 US. Cl..., 101/334, 101/98, 101/101,

101/104;; [51] lnt. Cl B4lk 1/42 [58] Field of Search 101/327, 333, 334,101/98,'10l,103,104,105,108 [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS2,884,858 5/1959 Boekeloo et a1 101/327 3,370,531 2/1968 Falk 101/108 X3,164,086 l/l965 Keck 101/105X 2,678,626 5/1954 Garvey 101/105 X3,364,855 l/l968 Boekeloo et al..... 101/327 2,829,594 4/1958 Goc101/334 X 2,654,312 10/1953 Phipps 101/334 X 533,621 2/1895 Thompson....101/334 3,359,897 12/1967 Harte 101/334 3,307,479 3/1967 Mcssmer 101/334Primary ExaminerRobert E. Pulfrey Assistant Examiner-Eugene H. EickholtAttarney--Cushman, Darby & Cushman [57 ABSTRACT A holder for an inkingpad is provided which is removably mountable on a manually operatedprinting stamper; the holder consists of a rectangular sheet of flexiblematerial having notches cut out adjacent each ;of its corners and arectangular slot positioned equidista ntly from its upper and loweredges; the dimensions of the sheet are such that it may be bent into anarcuate "shape and the notches positioned in engagement with {the frameof the stamper whereby, due to its resilience, i the holder will bemaintained in engagement with the frame of the stamper; a felt inkingpad is inserted through the slot of the holder so that a portion of theT pad intersects the path of the printing elements of the stamper sothat when the printing elements are actuated to move through the path,they will come into contact with the inking pad to receive a coating ofink.

4 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures 6/1960 Clausing ..l0l/334' PRICE STAMPER ANDSTAINLESS STEEL PAD HOLDER BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The presentinvention relates to improvements in self-inking hand stampers and, moreparticularly, to a novel inking pad'holder arrangement.

In many retailing outlets, where large quantities of different pricedarticles are vended, it has been found desirable from the point of viewof efficiency to print the price on each article to reduce the checkingout time of each customer and to enable the cashiers to quickly andaccurately recordthe price of each article in totaling up the charge tothe customer. Manual price stampers of the self-inking type have beenwidely used in such outlets to affix the prices on the various articles.Such stampers have generally consisted of two frame members one of whichis movable with respect to the other, and the other of which is firstplaced in contact with the article to be priced. The movable frame isusually provided with a printing element carrier which consists in aplurality of flexible belts having printing indicia formed thereon. Thecarrier is generally arranged so that the printing indicia aremaintained under a constant spring force in contact with an inking padso that, when the stamper is actuated, the printing elements on thedistal end of the carrier move through a generally arcuate path intoengagement with the article to be stamped. Subsequently, the printingcarrier returnsto its original position with the printing elements inengagement with the inking pad. The ink which is generally used withsuch stampers is of the quick drying, indelible type so as to preventsmearing or erasure of the price once it is affixedto the article.

While such price stampers have enabled retailers to rapidly affixdifferent prices to a large number of descrete articles certaininconveniences and difficulties have been encountered with respect tothe handling and operation of the inking pads used in the devices of theprior art. More specifically, in some of the stampers presently in use,as a result of the constant spring force with which the printingelements are pressed into the inking pad when the stamper is not in usethere has resulted the formation of indentations in the pad of the shapeof the indicia that'happen to be located on the distal end of theprinting carrier. As a result, when different indicia are placed in theprinting position, the latter indicia are not evenly coated with inkthus often rendering the marking illegible.

Moreover, the pad holders of the prior art have generally beenpositioned in the frame of the stamper so that the application of inkthereto has been a difficult and often messy operation. In still otherarrangements, it has been necessary to first remove the pad completelyfrom the frame in order to supply the pad with ink. An additionaldifficulty with the ink pads of the prior art has been the problem ofseepage of ink from the pad onto the printing bands which, due to thenature of the ink employed, has resulted in the sticking of the bands toeach other and to their carrier when the ink dried. Quite frequently,breakage of the bands resulted when pressure was exerted upon thesebands to loosen them. Furthermore, due to the fact that the inking padshave generally been encased in a holder, the pads have had a tendency tobecome quite hard and brittle thus rendering them altogether useless.

The prior art solutions to the foregoing problems have generallyinvolved the addition of elaborate and often complicated pad holdingarrangements to existing price stampers which has contributedsubstantially to the manufacturing costs of the stampers as well asrequired an increase in the number of moving parts which are subject towear and breakage.

The present invention avoids all the foregoing disadvantages byproviding an inking pad holder which can be inexpensively adapted tocooperate with a large variety of price stampers and which will functionmuch more reliably than the arrangements which have heretofore beenproposed.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The inking pad holder of the present inventionconsists in a rectangular plate constructed from a resilient materialsuch as spring treated stainless steel. A slot is provided atapproximately the midpoint of the plate and which extends substantiallyparallel to the edges'of the plat that are attached to the frame of aconventional price stamper. The dimensions of the slot are such that aflexible pad of felt material may be inserted into the slot to befrictionally engaged by the edges of the slot. With the price stampersof the type where the printing element moves through a substantiallysemicircular path when the stamper is actuated, the pad holder ispositioned on the frame so that a portion of the inking pad will bepositioned at a point intersecting the path of travel of the printingelement. The dimensions of the inking pad are chosen so that all of theprinting indicia on the printing element will be contacted by the inkingpad as the element travels through its arcuate path.

With the foregoing arrangement, the useful life of the inking pad issubstantially prolonged and will function to supply ink evenly to all ofthe printing indicia on the printing bands of the stamper.

It is a principal object of the present invention, therefore, to providean inking pad holder that can be quickly and easily positioned on theprice stamper and which can be easily supplied with printing ink.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an inking padholder which will maintain the inking pad in a position where ink willbe supplied to the printing elements uniformly over a prolonged periodof use. Another object of the present invention is to provide a padholder that so positions the pad that it will not be subjected to aconstant pressure from printing elements in contact therewith when theprice stamper is not in use.

A further object of the present invention is to supply an inking padholder that will operate to provide clearly printed charactersthroughout a much larger number of printing operations.

A still further object of the present invention is to provide an inkingpad holder that will permit easy and thorough cleaning of the pricestamper.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an inking padholder that is extremely simple and inexpensive to manufacture.

These and other objects and attendant advantage will become apparent asfurther consideration is given to the following detailed descriptiontogether with the accompanying drawings, in which:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a side view in elevation ofa conventional manually operated price stamper to which the pad holderof the present invention is attached illustrating the disposition ofelements in a partially actuated position.

FIG. 2 is a front view in elevation, partly in section of FIG. 1 butwith the stamper in an unactuated position; and

FIG. 3 is another embodiment of the inking pad holder of the presentinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Referring now to the drawings,there is illustrated in FIG. 1, a conventional manually-operated stampergenerally designated at which consists of a base frame generallydesignated at 12 and a movable frame indicated at 14.

The base frame 12 has a pair of side members 16 and 18, a top crossmember 20 and a bottom plate member 22 which is formed with asubstantially rectangular opening (not shown) through which the printingelements pass on the downstroke of the stamper 10. On either side of theopening in plate 22 on the exterior face thereof, there are providedpads 24 and 26 which engage the surface 28 on which indicia are to beprinted.

Referring to FIG. 2, a shaft 30 is secured to the top of cross member 20of base frame 12 and extends upwardly therefrom.

The movable frame 14 consists of side members 32 and 34 which areconnected by a cross member 36. Member 36 has an aperture 38 throughwhich shaft 30 extends. On the top side of member 36 there is secured ahollow, tubular handle 40, disposed concentrically about aperture 38. Acoil spring 42 is located inside handle 40 with one end of the springabutting the closed end of handle 40 and with the lower end of thespring resting against a washer 44 which is secured to the top end ofshaft 30. The force of spring 42 operates to maintain frames 12 and 14in the relative positions shown in FIG. 2. Referring to FIG. 1 again,side member 16 of base frame 12 is formed with a cam slot 46 which isshown partially in dotted lines. The opposite side member 18 is providedwith an identical cam slot (not shown). The lower end of side member 34is formed with oppositely bent ears 48 and 50 and side frame 52 isprovided with similarly formed ears, one of which is shown in dottedlines in FIG. 2 at 52. These ears function to maintain the frames 12 and14 in proper alignment during the printing stroke of the stamper 10. Acarrier 54 is rotatably supported on rod 56 which extends through bothcam slots formed in side members 16 and 18 as well as through a slot 58formed in side member 34 and a corresponding slot formed in side member32 (not shown) and is secured in position by suitable means such as aretainer pin 60. Carrier 54 supports a plurality of printing belts, oneof which is shown at 62. Each printing belt is constructed from aflexible material such as rubber and is formed with a variety ofprinting elements of indicia such as at 64. Each belt 62 is mounted atone end about a rotatable drum 66 which can be rotated to move thedesired printing indicia on each belt 62 over the distal end of thecarrier 54 as at 65.

When the stamper 10 is not in use, the printing indicia in the positionat 65 would be rotated clockwise as viewed in FIG. I and would be urgedupwardly into engagement with the underside of cross member 20. With ingfrom the underside of cross member 20 and terminating at the surface ofthe article 28.

The foregoing has been a description of a conventional hand stamperwherein it has generally been the practice to locate an inked pad on theunderside of cross member 20 so that, when the stamper is not in use,the printing elements on the distal end of the carrier 54 would bepressed into the pad.

The improved inking pad holder of the present invention as illustratedin FIG. 1 consists of an angled, substantially rectangular plate 68which may be constructed from any sturdy resilient material such asspring treated stainless steel.

Referring to FIG. 2, the top edge 70 of plate 68 is provided withnotches 72 and 74 and the lower edge 76 is provided with similarlylocated notches 78 and 80. The respective notches are spaced apart oneach edge 70 and 76 so that they may engage the edges of side members 16and 18 when the plate 68 is mounted on base frame 12.

A generally rectangular slot 82 is formed in plate 68 intermediate theedges 70 and 76 and extends generally parallel to the edges 70 and 76.The width of the slot 82 should be formed so that a felt pad 84 maybeforced therethrough and frictionally engaged by the edges of the slot asshown in FIG 1 so that one end of the pad 84 will be held in a fixedposition while the opposite end of the pad 84 will intersect the arcuatepath of the printing elements on the printing belt 62 mounted on carrier54.

The plate 68 is preferably manufactured from a resilient material sothat it can be easily mounted on base frame 12 by slightly compressingthe plate member to bring the edges 70 and 76 closer together so thatwhen the plate member is mounted on the base frame 12 a slight springforce will be exerted in opposite directions on cross member 20 andbottom plate member 22.

One of the chief advantages of this arrangement is that the pad holder 6can be easily removed from the hand stamper when it is necessary toresupply the pad 84 with ink or to gain access to the printing belts forthe purpose of changing the indicia or cleaning the belts.

It is not necessary that the plate take the angled shape illustrated inFIG. 1 since it is only necessary that the plate position the inking padso that one edge of the pad intersects the arcuate path of the printingindicia. In FIG. 3, for example, there is illustrated an arcuatelyshaped plate 86 having notches along its top and bottom edges similar tothe notches formed in plate 68 in the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 1and 2 and with an inking pad 84' similarly positioned in a slot 88formed intermediate the top and bottom edges of the plate. Thisembodiment is useful where the arcuate path of the distal end of theprint carrier moves through an arc of greater radius than that of thehand stamper illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2.

By positioning the inking pad to one side of the arcuate path of theprinting elements, the pad will be flexed upon each printing stroke ofthe stamper so that, in the event that the stamper has not been used fora period of time resulting in the stiffening of the inking pad, the padmay be easily restored to its soft conditionby simply operating thestamper a few times to flex the pad and loosen its fibers. Such flexingalso is effective to redistribute the supply of ink provided the pad hasnot completely dried out.

In comparison test, it has been found that the arrangement of thepresent invention will provide a substantially greater number of clearimpressions when supplied with the same quantity of ink than a stamperwhere the pad is located on the underside of the cross member 20.

While the foregoing description relates to a preferred I embodiment ofthe present invention it will be understood that various changes andmodifications may be made therein without departing from the spirit andscope of the invention as defined in the appended claims.

What is claimed is: U 1. An inking pad holder for self-inkin'g stampersof the type having a'frame including spaced side walls and generallyparallel upper and lower end plates extending transversely of andconnected to said side walls, carrier means movably mounted on saidframe for supporting at least one printing element; said printingelement being movable along a path between a deactuated, nonprintingposition and an actuated, printing position in response to movement ofsaid carrier means with respect to said frame,

said pad holder comprising a resilient plate member having first andsecond generally parallel edge portions with recesses formed thereinspaced apart a distance substantially equal to the distance between saidside walls, said plate member having a longitudinal dimension betweensaid first and second edge portions that is greater than the distancebetween said upper and lower end plates on said frame so that, when saidplate member is arcuately deformed, said recesses will engage said sidewalls of said frame adjacent their intersection with said upper andlower end plates, said plate member having means for supporting aninking pad with one portion of the pad positioned out of the path oftravel of said printing element and fixed relative to said frame andwith another portion of the pad intersecting said path so that saidprinting element will come into contact with said other portion of thepad at said intersection as said printing element moves along said pathbetween said deactuated and actuated positions.

2. The inking pad holder as claimed in claim 1 wherein said inking padsupporting means comprises an elongated slot having two elongated sidesextending generally parallel with said edges of said plate member, saidslot being formed in said resilient plate member at approximately themidpoint of said plate member, and the distance between said elongatedsides of said slot being such that at least a portion of said inking padwill be frictionally engaged therebetween.

3. The inking pad holder as claimed in claim 2 wherein said inking padis rectangular in cross section and has length width and 'heighthdimensions whereby when one end of said pad is inserted into said slot,the other end thereof will intersect said path of travel of saidprinting element where said pad holder is mounted on said frame;

4. An inking pad for self-inking stampers of the type having a frameincluding spaced side walls and generally parallel upper and lower endplates extending transversely of and connected to said side walls,carrier means movably mounted on said frame for supporting at least oneprinting element, said printing element being movable along a pathbetween a deactuated, nonprinting position and an actuated, printingposition in response to movement of said carrier means with respect tosaid frame,

said pad holder comprising a resilient plate member having first andsecond edge portions, said edge portions having attachment means forattaching said edge portions of said plate member to said frame, saidplate member having a longitudinal dimension between said first andsecond edge portions that is greater than the distance between saidupper and lower end plates on said frame so that, when said plate memberis arcuately deformed, said attachment means will engage said framemember adjacent the intersection of said side walls with said upper andlower end plates, said plate member having means for supporting aninking pad with one portion of the pad positioned out of the path oftravel of said printing element and fixed relative to said frame andwith another portion of the pad intersecting said path so that saidprinting element will come into contact with said other portion of thepad at said intersection as said printing element moves along said pathbetween said deactuated and actuated positions.

1. An inking pad holder for self-inking stampers of the type having aframe including spaced side walls and generally parallel upper and lowerend plates extending transversely of and connected to said side walls,carrier means movably mounted on said frame for supporting at least oneprinting element, said printing element being movable along a pathbetween a deactuated, nonprinting position and an actuated, printingposition in response to movement of said carrier means with respect tosaid frame, said pad holder comprising a resilient plate member havingfirst and second generally parallel edge portions with recesses formedtherein spaced apart a distance substantially equal to the distancebetween said side walls, said plate member having a longitudinaldimension between said first and second edge portions that is greaterthan the distance between said upper and lower end plates on said frameso that, when said plate member is arcuately deformed, said recesseswill engage said side walls of said frame adjacent their intersectionwith said upper and lower end plates, said plate member having means forsupporting an inking pad with one portion of the pad positioned out ofthe path of travel of said printing element and fixed relative to saidframe and with another portion of the pad intersecting said path so thatsaid printing element will come into contact with said other portion ofthe pad at said intersection as said printing element moves along saidpath between said deactuated and actuated positions.
 2. The inking padholder as claimed in claim 1 wherein said inking pad supporting meanscomprises an elongated slot having two elongated sides extendinggenerally parallel with said edges of said plate member, said slot beingformed in said resilient plate member at approximately the midpoint ofsaid plate member, and the distance between said elongated sides of saidslot being such that at least a portion of said inking pad will befrictionally engaged therebetween.
 3. The inking pad holder as claimedin claim 2 wherein said inking pad is rectangular in cross section andhas length width and heighth dimensions whereby when one end of said padis inserted into said slot, the other end thereof will intersect saidpath of travel of said printing element where said pad holder is mountedon said frame.
 4. An inking pad for self-inking stampers of the typehaving a frame including spaced side walls and generally parallel upperand lower end plates extending transversely of and connected to saidside walls, carrier means movably mounted on said frame for supportingat least one printing element, said printing element being movable alonga path between a deactuated, nonprinting position and an actuated,printing position in response to movement of said carrier means withrespect to said frame, said pad holder comprising a resilient platemember having first and second edge portions, said edge portions havingattachment means for attaching said edge portions of said plate memberto said frame, said plate member having a longitudinal dimension betweensaid first and second edge portions that is greater than the distancebetween said upper and lower end plates on said frame so that, when saidplate member is arcuately deformed, said attachment means will engagesaid frame member adjacent the intersection of said side walls with saidupper and lower end plates, said plate member having means forsupporting an inking pad with one portion of the pad positioned out ofthe path of travel of said printing element and fixed relative to saidframe and with another portion of the pad intersecting said path so thatsaid printing element will come into contact with said other portion ofthe pad at said intersection as said printing element moves along saidpath between said deactuated and actuated positions.